A Select Comparison/Contrast of the Democratic & Republican Platforms on Issues Important to U.S. Workers

With the political convention rhetoric soaring and political ads about to carpet bomb the airwaves, we thought it might be useful to comparison/contrast the Democratic and Republican platforms and show for U.S. workers both have policy agendas which will damage the middle class. The Democratic platform is here and the Republican one, seemingly not even indexed by Google, is here, in large pdf form. Let's take economic and labor issues and compare them side by side.

Comparison of Democrat and Republican Platforms

Issue

Democrat

Republican

U.S. Worker Choice

University Green Card ATM

Yes

Yes

Both Bad

More Guest Worker Visas

Yes

Yes

Both Bad

China Currency Manipulator

No

Yes

GOP

Bad Trade Deals

Yes

Yes

Both Bad

Financial Reform

Yes

No

Dem

Student Loans

Yes

No

Dem

Outsourcing

Yes

Yes

Both Bad

Unlimited Migration/Immigration

Yes

No

GOP

Unions

Yes

No

Dem

Taxes on the Rich

Yes

No

Dem

1. Turn our University System into a Green Card ATM

Both Republicans and Democrats want to turn our university system into a green card machine for foreigners. Both parties are saying to foreigners if you graduate from a U.S. university, you get a green card. Not only will this destroy what's left of the Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics career fields for U.S. citizens, it will also further squeeze out opportunities for Americans to even get into college in the first place. This agenda will clearly corrupt our Academic system from it's primary purpose, to educate those paying for the University, the state and federal taxpayer citizenry. This green card ATM agenda has been demanded by corporate lobbyists and foreign countries, in particular India. From the Democratic Platform:

And to make this country a destination for global talent and ingenuity, we won't deport deserving young people who are Americans in every way but on paper, and we will work to make it possible for foreign students earning advanced degrees in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics to stay and help create jobs here at home.

From the Republican Platform:

Foreign students who graduate from an American university with an advanced degree in science, technology, engineering or math should be encouraged to remain here

Displacing Americans, denying opportunity to Americans, including funding for starting new businesses does not create more jobs. It is exactly how it appears, we lose jobs for once again our government refuses to invest and support her citizenry. On top of that, the geniuses of the world already can immigrate to the United States. For the truly brilliant, there is no limitation or quota.

2. U.S. Worker Displacement by Increasing Foreign Guest Worker Visas

Both Republicans and Democrats want more foreign guest worker Visas in spite of the overwhelming evidence, in every single occupational category, there is no worker shortgage and people cannot get jobs in their field of study. From the Democratic Platform:

We need an immigration reform that creates a system for allocating visas that meets our economic needs.

From the Republican Platform:

a policy of strategic immigration, granting more work visas to holders of advanced degrees in science, technology, engineering, and math from other nations.

3. Label China a Currency Manipulation

The Republicans have the upper hand on this one. From the Republican Platform:

A Republican President will insist on full parity in trade with China and stand ready to im-pose countervailing duties if China fails to amend its currency policies. Commercial discrimination will be met in kind. Counterfeit goods will be aggressively kept out of the country. Victimized private firms will be encouraged to raise claims in both U.S. courts and at the World Trade Organization. Punitive measures will be imposed on foreign firms that misappropriate American technology and intellectual property. Until China abides by the WTO’s Government Procurement Agreement, the United States government will end procurement of Chinese goods and services.

To date the Obama administration has refused to label China a currency manipulator, or to enact corresponding tariffs. While the Democratic platform tries to imply they are doing something, the reality is this administration has not.

Both publicly and privately, the President has made clear to the Chinese government that it needs to take steps to appreciate its currency so that America is competing on a level playing field. This administration has doubled the rate of trade cases brought against China by the last administration, and created a new government-wide Interagency Trade Enforcement Center. The President is committed to continuing to fight unfair trade practices that disadvantage American producers and workers, including illegal subsidies, non-tariff barriers, and abuse of worker rights or environmental standards.

4. More Bad Trade Deals

Both parties want to pass the TPP and are all in for more bad trade deals. This is in spite of the overwhelming evidence these treaties have cost America millions of jobs and stunted economic growth. Both platforms are so riddled with lies it's hard to pull out the position. From the Democratic platform:

We remain committed to finding more markets for American-made goods—including using the Trans-Pacific Partnership between the United States and eight countries in the Asia-Pacific.

From the Republican Platform:

A Republican President will complete negotiations for a Trans-Pacific Partnership to open rapidly developing Asian markets to U.S. products.

5. Financial Reform

We all know the Banksters are alive and doing well and real financial reform never happened. The Republicans want to roll back what little we got. From the Republican Platform:

No peril justifies the regula-tory impact of Obamacare on the practice of medicine,the Dodd-Frank Act on financial services, or the EPA’s and OSHA’s overreaching regulation agenda. A Re-publican Congress and President will repeal the first and second, and rein in the third.

The Democratic Platform is more a blast at the GOP. Clearly there will be no effort to break up TBTF fails or restore Glass-Steagall. That said, they did enact the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, even though they gutted it. From the Democratic Platform:

We've created a single consumer watchdog agency whose sole job is looking out for working families by protecting them from deceptive and unfair lending practices of mortgage brokers, payday lenders, debt collectors, and other financial institutions.

6. Student Loans

What is missing from the Democratic platform is debt forgiveness and allowing student loans to be discharged in bankruptcy. The GOP simply want to privatize student loans. From the GOP platform:

The federal government should not be in the business of originating student loans; however, it should serve as an insurance guarantor for the private sector as they offer loans to students.

The Democrats want to set up a scalability payback program and expand the time to repay the loans.

We're creating avenues for students to manage their federal student loans so that their payments can be only 10 percent of what they make each month.

7. Offshore Outsourcing

The GOP don't even mention offshore outsourcing, but that said, they amplify the relationship with India, the top offshore outsourcing destination for American services jobs. The India BPO industry is over 6.4% of their GDP at this point. From the Republican platform:

We welcome a stronger relationship with the world’s largest democracy, India, both economic and cultural, as well as in terms of national security. We hereby affirm and declare that India is our geopolitical and a strategic trading partner.

The GOP don't even wish to acknowledge our national borders so corporations don't have to pay taxes:

To switch to a territorial system of corporate taxation, so that profits earned and taxed abroad may be repatriated for job-creating investment here at home without additional penalty.

The Democratic platform isn't much better and clearly implies we're on our own in terms of giving away our jobs to other countries, the same as the GOP.

We must out-educate, out-innovate, and out-build the world.

We Democrats support lowering the corporate tax rate while closing unnecessary loopholes, and lowering rates even further for manufacturers who create good jobs at home.

8. Unlimited Migration/Immigration

Both the GOP and the Democrats seem to be all for increasing the U.S. labor supply through unlimited migration and immigration. That said, the GOP has been the party which has blocked most of this agenda due to their refusal to endorse Amnesty or a pathway to citizenship for those illegally here. That said, be very aware multinational corporations as well as special interests and foreign nations demand more foreign guest workers, more offshore outsourcing and more illegal workers every day. Being able to relocate labor supply around the globe upon the whims of corporations has been an agenda for the last 30 years.

From the Democratic platform:

The country urgently needs comprehensive immigration reform that brings undocumented immigrants out of the shadows and requires them to get right with the law, learn English, and pay taxes in order to get on a path to earn citizenship. We need an immigration reform that creates a system for allocating visas that meets our economic needs, keeps families together, and enforces the law.

From the Republican platform, the GOP is against a pathway to citizenship and for even more foreign guest worker Visas.

We oppose any form of amnesty for those who, by intentionally violating the law, disadvantage those who have obeyed it.

[We need] the utility of a legal and reliable source of foreign labor
where needed through a new guest worker program.

9. Unions

No doubt about it the GOP wants to destroy unions. From the GOP platform:

We will restore the rule of law to labor law by blocking “card check,” enacting the Secret Ballot Pro-tection Act, enforcing the Hobbs Act against labor violence, and passing the Raise Act to allow all workers to receive well-earned raises without the approval of their union representative. We demand an end to the Project Labor Agreements; and we call for repeal of the Davis-Bacon Act, which costs the taxpayers billions of dollars annually in artificially high wages on government projects. We support the right of States to enact Right-to-Work laws and encourage
them to do so to promote greater economic liberty.

From the Democratic platform:

We will fight for collective bargaining rights for police officers, nurses, firefighters, emergency medical technicians, teachers, and other public sector workers—jobs that are a proven path to the middle class for millions of Americans. We will continue to vigorously oppose "Right to Work" and "paycheck protection" efforts, and so-called "Save our Secret Ballot" measures whenever they are proposed.

10. Taxes

There isn't much to say beyond, the GOP continues their obviously wrong, supply side, trickle upon, trickle down tax agenda.

Extend the 2001 and 2003 tax relief packages—commonly known as the Bush tax cuts—pending reform of the tax code, to keep tax rates from rising on income, interest, divdends, and capital gains; Reform the tax code by reducing marginaltax rates by 20 percent across-the-board in a revenue-neutral manner;
Eliminate the taxes on interest, dividends, and capital gains altogether for lower and middle-income taxpayers; End the Death Tax; and Repeal the Alternative Minimum Tax.

From the Democratic Platform:

We support allowing the Bush tax cuts for the wealthiest to expire and closing loopholes and deductions for the largest corporations and the highest-earning taxpayers. We are committed to reforming our tax code so that it is fairer and simpler, creating a tax code that lives up to the Buffett Rule so no millionaire pays a smaller share of his or her income in taxes than middle class families do. We are also committed to reforming the corporate tax code to lower tax rates for companies in the United States, with additional relief for those locating manufacturing and research and development on our shores, while closing loopholes and reducing incentives for corporations to shift jobs overseas.

There is much more to be offended by in these policy platforms. Both parties seem hell bent on labor arbitrage and race to sacrifice the U.S. worker on the globalization altar. Both platforms put the U.S. citizen worker last for jobs in the United States. We get platitudes and blow off patronizing policy, such as we must retrain, even though we already have the skills. What's missing in these platforms that could actually help the U.S. worker is as wide as the grand canyon. Bottom line neither party is really going to put the U.S. citizenry first or make jobs for Americans their top priority.

These aren’t just broken promises, these are all broken promises that have to do with the economic and political rights of the relatively powerless. Privacy, union rights, debtor’s rights, activist rights, etc – they were promised tangible stuff, and didn’t get it. It looks like the Obama campaign will get a bounce from the convention, because the convention is well-organized and a good show. Just recognize that this show in 2008 had nothing to do with the ultimate policy that was enacted, and it’s likely that the 2012 convention will see a similar outcome.

That's the bottom line. It's clear corporations and foreign interests are demanding more foreign guest workers and it's also clear our university system is demanding green cards to continue their supply of foreigners who pay more in tuition. The more a policy is really about the U.S. worker and middle class, the less of a prayer's chance it has to get enacted. Bottom line, both parties will kowtow to their lobbyist masters and large donors. The middle class be damned, no matter how soaring the rhetoric is.

Meta:

Comments

There is much to be disgusted by and we hope you put additional red alerts in the comments.

This one, which doesn't have much to do with the U.S. worker is just astounding it's in print in 2012. From the GOP platform:

The effectiveness of our foreign aid has been limited by the cultural agenda of the current Administration, attempting to impose on foreign countries, especially the peoples of Africa, legalized abortion and the homosexual rights agenda.

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Too funny, "legalized abortion and the homosexual rights agenda." Seriously? WTF? They get paid to sit there in DC or Koch HQ or Murdoch HQ and dream this crap up?
I don't know, but foreign aid is ineffective for many other reasons. Just look at Afghanistan as an example - is that due to corruption as a way of life and completely unfixable + heroin as the chief export? The fact that Karzai will do and say anything to make sure he survives and keeps as much of his $ as possible when the Taliban takes over? Or is there also a "legalized abortion and homosexual rights" agenda there in Afghanistan of all places too we don't know about? I'll go with the former reasons.

Africa and other continents, well, it could be because the USG, GOP and Dems, love USAID and endless bureaucracies that have endless meetings, tens of thousands of employees, create report after report for decades that observe and report the same exact thing year after year along with the UN, and have hundreds of NGOs that duplicate efforts. Oh, almost forgot, the fact that we support rulers no matter how corrupt they are and then act completely shocked when a civil war occurs, they are thrown out, and shockingly, they have billions of US taxpayer aid in secret Swiss bank accounts that the US Govt. somehow never knew about despite Treasury, FinCEN, OFAC laws and regs, DOJ Money Laundering units, etc. Once again, getting paid for nothing. The locals knew the leaders were completely corrupt and that's why they overthrow them, but our govt., well, they just can't seem to see the corruption when leaders are flying all over the world for conferences, vacations, shopping sprees, and health care while their own people starve to death.

Foreign aid and policy are wrong for so many other reasons. While we spend the billions overseas, the Chinese reap the benefits by signing deals with local authorities basically locking in minerals and oil for China while we get locked out (that kind of sucks).

Also, as a side note, did you know the African leader (now dead former leader) Muammar Gaddafi's son, Khamis, toured the US as a guest of the US State Dept. weeks before he joined the fight against the rebels (the same rebels we helped)? It was covered in the media. Yeah, most Americans should be confused by that one. And yet that's just one example. So there are many, many reasons our aid is a mess, but the "homosexual agenda" and "abortion," well, that's just idiotic. But then again that's why we don't have a say because we just don't follow that awesome groupthink at the top that's working out so well for the US and other countries these days.

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There are certain countries, where the U.S. routinely trades away our jobs for some nebulous foreign policy agenda.

I didn't cover retirement, Medicare/Medicaid and social security, but have in other posts.

That was my reaction, OMG they put into a platform document the claim Obama is trying to make Africa gay and kill their babies, are you shittin' me???

Then again, we can hear similar crap on Faux news or radio any day of the week. Unbelievable.

Right, I think the GOP would be a shoe in if they were sane, offering sound policies based on real economics, even business slanted, but they are not. I call this worse and worser.

I wanted to amplify that green card agenda, it is just obscene, the U.S. university system has been the best in the world and magically they educated their own state residents and U.S. citizens first, as their top priority. Things are going downhill fast here and there was one university in CA who literally refused to admit anyone who was a state resident or even a U.S. citizen, "foreigners only" needed to apply and yes, a public, state tax funded university.

Think of the bias going on against Americans in our own taxpayer funded higher educational system, not just even getting in, being denied entrance, but grades, research opportunities, and so on.

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This article is another piece of fluff which really has no substance. Reforming pensions is not anti-worker, nor is reigning in unions which have ridiculous demands. It is a lying article just liek the Democrat platform. Ever notice that about half of women voters are against abortion being legal, yet the RNC platform is called "anti-women's health"? Workers are better off by getting insurance and government out of the hospitals completely, repealing Obamacare,and not squashing small business under a new wave of taxes.

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Dear automaton, we hope the GOP is paying you to write comments like this, because if you're on our own, your brain is shut off.

Sorry, but the statistics show if you really want to help small business, you would enact that outrageously socialist agenda called single payer universal health care like most other modern societies have. That is the one which takes the burden of health insurance out of the hands of business and reduces their costs substantially.

I doubt any poll claims most women are wanting to have men control their bodies and their health, but our site doesn't do wedge issues.

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The Third Way and other corporate think tanks are a threat to US workers because they are happy to have the imported workers trained overseas to US corporate specifications. If we ever have a functional Congress, our relationships in terms of trade agreements and tax code need to support a viable economy with job development within the US.

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Remittances are actually huge, this is when someone sends funds back to the home country. MNCs like foreigners because they offshore outsource, often the business model is to offshore outsource itself, or do something to improve the economy of the home country. Honestly I cannot say for sure but I imagine if we had some hiring and rejection statistics, based on resume submission, we'd find massive hiring discrimination against U.S. citizens as well.

That said, international talent and capturing that talent to help the U.S. is a good thing and a long U.S. tradition. The problem is, with 53% of new college grads not being able to get a job and a good 2 million U.S. citizens with technical college degrees unable to find work in their field....

We have plenty of home grown talent being discarded, laid to waste and it's becoming increasingly evident we have discrimination, against U.S. citizens, based on being born in America happening in employment as well as start-up land.

The destruction of talent who happen to have been born in the United States is one of the biggest unsung economic tragedies of our age and no one is talking about it. Imagine the loss of innovation, of patents, of ground breaking technologies in STEM being lost every day due to the unbelievable anti-American attitudes of those in power and yes that means our government.

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Let's just assume those who pay get what they want from their selected politicians before giving us the "choice" on election day, otherwise it wouldn't make any sense. Examine the lists below taken from opensecrets.org; there are many people in banking, law, education, technology, and other fields that would have their eyes on more visas + easier immigration policies, less regulation of banking because what could go wrong with less regulation, technology issues, and making more piles of money in "non-profit" (yeah, right) education. Casinos also present, but then shouldn't they be casinos/FDIC-backed banks. And for those who think Obama or any politician would actually go after the banks, in 2008, the top contributor to the DNC was Goldman Sachs and the third was JP Morgan. Bain Capital also made the list (now that's politics for you), along with Deutsche Bank and all the rest of the people we've come to know and not love. I guess Barclays can fix LIBOR rates and also contribute to our Presidential elections, no problem. Let's consider these donors our true dictators of policy, and the elected merely their puppets.

They denied acceptance for U.S. citizens to college, foreigners only need apply, I kid you not and they are state funded. See Saturday reads for details.

It's positively disgusting they are buying off politics, with taxpayer money no less, to make sure less Americans get opportunity to a college degree, including graduate school.

As far as Romney goes, we see why the GOP has decided financial reform and regulations need to be repealed from their donor class. There are all our TBTF Banksters.

The University of California education system is clearly so out of line, so out of control and one would think the citizens of California would plain demand all of their funding be cut, or demand that system be reined in.

I'm not sure of all of Google's motivations to be pimping for Obama, beyond foreign guest worker Visas. Yes folks, Google labor arbitrages too and so does Apple, although nothing like the India body shops or Microsoft, Intel and Cisco do. I don't think that can be their motivation, probably has to due to monopoly, initiatives, taxes, FCC and so on. Anyway, Google is the least of my own political corporate worries.

Tech generally is probably demanding R&D tax credits, exemptions, which are good juju, ok, should be given. Anyone believing that tax loophole to repatriate offshore corporate profits, often made by offshore outsourcing our jobs is going to close are dreaming. Tech companies are high on the list with offshore profits and they assuredly want the "Republican plan". No way will Democrat puppet master corporations allow that to happen.

But we saw this in financial reform. Key Democrats came into kill anything meaningful, including derivatives reform.

Our choice, worse and worser, we clearly have no choice in a government by and for the people.

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The only talk of finance reform coming from anyone anymore is about the "unfair lending practices of mortgage brokers, payday lenders, debt collectors, and other financial institutions." --All non banks. What about the banks that caused this colossal economic failure we're still stuck with? No mention of them. If you think picking on payday lenders is finance reform, you are a sucker of the highest order.

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Both parties serve the money men, but Mitt Romney can't even stay quiet long enough to get his puppetmasters the position they are paying for. I know the crony capitalists in both D & R view us as worthless leeches and only suitable as slave labor to make crap when wages in the PRC or Bangladesh get too high or as people that can lick the dog sh*t off their kids' $500 shoes, but seriously, Mitt, shut up until you get into office.

Don't say you view us as worthless, no matter the fact that we number in the hundreds of millions and are the vast majority of Americans. Don't despise us when we serve in the military and then you claim in the next sentence that politicians really do care about those serving. Mitt, I'm sorry eighty year old men and women won't just die already and might not be able to toil on a highway crew to make sure you have access only for 1%er vehicles (sort of an HOV lane for the crony capitalists). Mitt, I'm sorry Thomas Paine and other Founding Fathers wrote and talked about social security systems and estate taxes so the handicapped and injured and elderly and sick could go on living productive, inspirational lives - read Paine's writings inbetween Ayn Rand and Murdoch's approved policy papers you dumb sh*t, people who helped found the USA and risked their lives for the common people in this country and in others knew a whole lot more than you and your moneymen puppetmasters and laid out what the USA was about for us today. Read Jefferson's writing bashing banksters - flies in the face of your bankster-love Mitt. He and others warned us about banks, and corporations, and other Presidents like Washington and Eisenhower warned us about foreign alliances and parties. Mitt, crack a book, think a thought.

More and more the 1%ers in both parties really do come off looking like they have special programs and camps for worthless people/"breeders and eaters" - their words are abhorrent. Sort of reminds us of other programs in recent history around the world where the elite wanted to rid society of those they viewed as worthless.

Mitt, leeches and dependent on government? Come on man, be honest for one day in your life. Your daddy was a lobbyist for auto and then, not too difficult to do, ran the auto state of Michigan as Governor. Taxpayers paid his salary. Seems to me he was as insider as you could get and collected paychecks for government work and lobbying. I'm sure he never made money from his "public service" he wasn't entitled to, right? You inherited his wealth. You inherited connections that got you into Harvard for bschool. You inherited connections into private equity. You collected government paychecks in Mass. courtesy of TAXPAYERS! Mitt, that's a whole lot of high-level public positions that most people never dream of having because we're busy actually busting our asses out here in real jobs and helping our family, friends, neighbors, and fellow citizens because we care.

And now we get lectured to by this son of privilege? F' that. No way. Mitt, banksters and other high level folks in politics and business are the ultimate leeches. They screw up year after year. They use our taxpayer money from the FDIC to backstop their endless gambles/mistakes. They commit crimes. They use our taxpayer money directly for their salaries and bonuses! Talk about leeches. Paul Ryan is a leech - must be, we're funding his job while he takes months off at a time to campaign for more money and power - that's a leech. Can we fire him and everyone else in DC?

Mitt, the unemployed and other Americans out here outside the top 1-5% never laundered money for terrorists or drug cartels like your moneymen banksters have admitted doing. So while you talk about foreign affairs, mention your donors laundering money for the terrorists attacking us. For the drug cartels killing judges, police, women, children, old and young men, and everyone else. Mitt, why so quiet? Mitt, go visit Afghanistan and tell the soldiers and Afghan civilians that banksters launder money for international drug cartels and help launder money for Iran that aids the Taliban. Mitt, hello? I guess all the teachers and police officers and doctors and engineers, scientists, nurses, shop owners, managers, and employees, electricians, plumbers, carpenters, professional drivers, pilots, vets, secretaries, artists, custodians, attorneys and judges, corrections officers, painters, and every single unemployed from those professions, etc., etc. that don't want to vote for him are useless leeches that view themselves as "victims"?

Corporations that outsource and bring in guest workers never responsible for anything bad? Only the unemployed are responsible for corporate-policies that bone them? Huh? Corporations that pollute our oceans and rivers need fewer laws? Corporations poisoned tens of thousands of infants but it's my fault and I'm worthless? Corporations can buy all levels of government to screw us over but it's my fault? All Americans not in boardrooms are lazy bastards? CEOs research and develop medicines and other products and market them and transport them and sell them globally and write about them all by themselves? Chester Cheetah says, "Most impressive, Sir."

Mitt, lesson #1, corporations aren't people, they are fictional entities for the sole purpose of limited liability, your ignorance only proves how you really did buy your degrees. If corporations want to be people, fine, the CEOs and everyone else that signs paperwork that commits LIBOR fixing, commodities manipulation, robosigning, foreclosing on vets while they are overseas, commingling funds and stealing them, can go right to prison like every other "person" under the law. They can also be sued personally. Send Dimon and Corzine and Blankfein to jail right now. Even if they aren't people, individuals in corporations are often held responsible for crimes (at least the non-TBTF ones). RICO and FCPA and other laws apply, just as a CEO can be indicted for murder or theft or terrorism. Just because criminals incorporate doesn't give them free reign to rape, murder, and steal, does it, Mitt? If a drug cartel incorporates, can it do as it pleases, laws be damned? Really?

No, this isn't partisan, it's just reflective of how little the people in power and their puppets in both parties honestly view the average Americans in our own country. This reality is so far from the vision our country was founded on. It's an abomination. It's only in the last decade or so we see the possible nightmare invading our waking hours. I think our Founding Fathers revolted for far less and now they are universally seen as heroes. "What say you, Mittens," Bill O' in a parallel universe wants to know, "are you smarter and more honest than our Nation's founders and the Constitution, the Bill of Rights, and all our Constitutional Amendments and the very people of the USA?" Because we might strongly disagree with that crap. Come out and mix with the folks you despise but want to vote for you or any other party run by the crony capitalists. Don't worry, we're not like the animals you portray us as, in fact, we might have something to add to your echo chamber.

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Romney may have gotten busted, but in practice, it's pretty clear some Democrats view the American people in the same way. Just something to manipulate and have go into debt to make sure they keep up consumer spending.

Romney is toast but I said this once he picked Ryan. Worse and worser but that doesn't make Obama or Congress better.

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Agreed, the list of donors I posted from opensecrets showed that 2008 Obama donors now simply move their bets to Romney (banksters fully supported Obama in 2008, now mostly Mitt), but of course they all still donate some to both parties. And if Romney loses, they'll just donate and/or lobby in whichever way suits their purposes.
Average American has no say. It's great that politicians do get busted on tape from both parties showing their actual contempt for us (besides their laws, voting records, and outright corruption). They go on and on about lazy, uneducated Americans sucking govt. money when most of us have better skills, educational backgrounds, work ethics, and simply want to be left alone without seeking some higher office to control other people. Being insulted by those seeking our votes is really too much. As if the defense contractors and big banks and large MNCs don't ask anything from the govt. or receive govt. subsidies or lobby the govt. for their funds and new laws? The large TBTF get our money directly from the Treasury to spend on themselves and lose on bets in privatized gains and socialized losses, there is no greater leech than that. When was the last time John Doe in a regular job went to DC and lobbied for a law to help him, got a direct link to the Fed and Treasury or DOJ or a handout and then was able to use that money for coke-fueled parties with hookers or vacation homes, or a govt. contract that his friends or former colleagues secured? The hypocrisy and double standards really are too much.

***Unrelated note showing banana republic status of USA - MF Global executives are possibly starting a new hedge fund.http://www.businessweek.com/news/2012-09-18/ex-mf-global-equity-derivati...
Notice how they blame "external forces." Excuses excuses, those banksters are never responsible, always have excuses but that's never mentioned by their puppet politicians. Jon Corzine is also thinking about starting a new hedge fund, apparently stealing billions already from farmers isn't enough and he really knows he'll never face any jail time or forfeiture in the USA ever.
Funny, the same hedge fund managers that finance campaigns that criticize the 99% and steal their money are all too willing to take the pension and mutual fund money from the same "commoners" they despise. Good enough to rob and step on, not good enough to have a voice in the rule of law or our own government I guess.

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Here's a classic that should interest EP readers. Market Watch went and charted the claims Romney just made in his Macaca moment.

Their graphs are here. If only the major financial press would graph up the claims made by politicians when actually fast tracking legislation written by lobbyists, although we do our best it would be nice if they joined in.

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It's a nice soundclip for someone at Fox News to yell out over anyone who might have actual facts and expertise before they drown him out and cut to commercial, but it's such crap. Without dealing with all the tax breaks and special capital gains issues those who have massive stock portfolios, manage hedge funds, etc. get, just look at the people in the lower brackets. Fine, so people are so poor in 2012 that they don't pay federal income taxes. What does that even prove? Lack of logic. Yeah, well, so Howard Hughes doesn't pay any federal income taxes in 2012 either along with many people born over 100 years ago. That's how stupid the argument is. Can I assume Howard Hughes is a lazy leech based on that fact along with all people born 100+ years ago? Or does his being dead having something to do with it too? Drawing idiotic causal relationships from stats apparently not an issue for braindead politicians and CEOs.

And many of those people are working poor or disabled or elderly that have no kids, or one kid, or two, and still don't earn enough to pay federal income taxes - so that makes them lazy or rather doomed by things outside their control? That's a social, political, and economic issue, not a "lazy" issue. People pay plenty of fees and taxes every single day, to think otherwise is a complete fabrication. Taxes on food and fuel, plenty of those. Someone making minimum wage pays for his insurance on his car, all sorts of taxes on fuel, tolls on roads and bridges and tunnels (and those private equity firms and Ayn Rand lovers do love privatizing every govt.-developed item so they can further rape workers with more tolls and fees), fees and taxes on phones and utilities, public transportation, property taxes on their houses, fees on apartments or condos, exorbitant fees on credit cards that always seem to have strange billing cycles, taxes that fund Social Security and Medicare, outrageous fees on bank accounts and heavy fees if someone uses alternative banking methods, and on and on. It's regressive and Romney, as someone that pretends to have some business and political sense, knows it. But like I said, it's a nice lie to yell at someone that protests the destruction of our society and middle class so the robber barons can run us over like roaches in their Rolls as they head to another closed-door meeting to plot our demise.

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Worse and worser. You can bet both parties, leadership will not enact policies which enable people to obtain employment, careers, quality of life, middle class to get off of dependencies and it's pretty damn bad when government officials believe Americans are fat, lazy and stupid. Truth is the Democrats should be labeled GOP and we need a new party, the people's party, to really get policy and legislation in the national interest.

I mean the rhetoric coming out of the GOP is so often bat shit crazy and not in statistical reality, the few things they point out which are true get buried in their muck.

That said, Democrats are busy trying to enact corporate lobbyist demands for more foreign workers, as we type. Think about that. We clearly have a jobs crisis, the economy is stalling and the only action we get is to more sure more foreigners are enabled to displace U.S. workers. This is really happening and shows also Democrats are buying into the idea Americans are fat, lazy and stupid. We have millions of advanced degree Americans who need a job right now and even more with advanced degrees who cannot get a job in their chosen field. It's positively obscene.

See any legislator pushing for a direct jobs program, even tax credits tied to hiring U.S. citizens and retaining the employees businesses already have? Nope. Goes to show what both parties really think of the American people and beyond throwing a token bone to sway an election, I sincerely doubt the U.S. citizen worker enters their corporate lobbyist donor and constituency brain.

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